1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to an image processing device and method. Specifically, the present invention relates to an image processing device and method for measuring the coordinates of a photographing device or an object by keeping track of a dynamic image of the object taken when the photographing device moves relative to the object.
2. Related Art
There has been a technique to measure the position of a photographing device by continuously photographing an object, while the photographing device is relatively moving to the object. When the photographing device is actually mounted on a moving body such as a car to perform photographing, however, the acquired images may occasionally be far from stable and require vertical or rotational corrections frame by frame, due to the sway of the car. In some cases, a moving object such as another car, a bird flying or a leaf falling, for example, may intervene between the photographing device and the object, causing characteristic points to be hidden behind and restored again. Thus, there is a need to process the sway of such a photographing device and characteristic points that disappear and reappear. On other hand, for the case where a stationary object is photographed with a stationary photographing device, there has been a 3D (three dimensional) measurement technique to precisely and automatically search for corresponding points and perform measurement. (See Patent Document 1.)    [Patent Document 1] Japanese Patent Application No. 2002-64094 (paragraphs [0018] to [0073], FIGS. 1 to 11, etc.)
Thus, it is required to provide a technique that can precisely measure the photographing position and posture of a photographing device and the coordinates of an object from moving images or photographed images that sequentially change gradually, even in the case with the need to process the sway of the photographing device and the disappearance and reappearance of characteristic points, by developing and applying the technique to photograph a stationary object with a stationary photographing device described above to the case where either one of them is mobile.
The objective of the present invention is to provide a technique to precisely measure the photographing position and posture of a photographing device or the coordinates of an object from moving images or photographed images that sequentially change gradually, even in the case with the need to process the sway of the photographing device and the disappearance and reappearance of characteristic points.